Bread has been around

for 5000 years. A record of bread recipes was first made

by Pliny the Elder in Roman Times.

Paul Pursglove

Slides for SOTMAS Talk and tasting – A History of Bread Baking – 7th March 2014

http://www.breadpages.org.uk/

Viking Blaanda Bread from Shetland

and Sweden – Archaeological Evidence Egyptian Khorasan Bread – Hieroglyph

and Archaeological Evidence Roman Bread of Pisenum – Early

Roman Recipe Tudor Peasebread – Last bake of the

day Lancashire Riddle Bread – Pub Grub

Examples of bread making

“The name is Old English for Mixed Bread”

Holger Arbman. 1943. Die Gräber. Birka: Untersuchungen und Studien, vol. 1. Stockholm: Kungl. Vitterhets Historie och Antikvitets Akadamien. The graves. Birka: investigations and studies, vol. 1 Remains of unleavened bread in a womans grave, early viking.

Hakon Hjelmqvist. 1986. "Botanische Analyse einiger Brote." Birka II:1, Systematische Analysen der Gräberfunde, ed. Greta Arwidsson, pp. 263-272. Stockholm: Almquist & Wiksell. Botanical analysis of some bread. Birka II Analysis of bread remains and grains at Birka (Bjӧrka), Sweden.

Blaanda Bread

Saddle Querns were used to grind grain into flour.

150g wholemeal barley flour50g wholemeal wheat flour2 teaspoons of crushed flax seeds2 teaspoons of lard or butter100 ml water

Mix the dry ingredients and rub in the lard or butter.Mix in the water to achieve a thick dough.Roll into balls and press flat to 20mm thickness (or less).Bake on a warm griddle – turn with a wooden spatula.

The Egyptian Empire

lasted 2000 years.

Khorasan wheat was used in the Ptolemaic Dynasty from 280 BC onwards.

It is often referred to as Golden Flour.

Egyptian Khorasan Bread

500g Kamut Flour5g “Dried Yeast”400ml Water15ml Olive Oil

Light kindling in the clay oven and burn foran hour and a half.Mix the ingredients into a stiff dough and rest for an hour.Knock back the dough and kneed. Shape intoFlat breads and leave to rise for 30 minutes.Rake out the oven and bake the bread until done.

Baking Egyptian Style

Roman Bread

The Romans were the first people in history to document bread recipes. Roman bakers were required to register with the Collegium Pistorum before they could sell their produce.

The earliest recorded recipes come from the time of Pliny the Elder. They are of course in Latin.

Roman Oven - Egypt

Mosaic – Villa near Paris

Lava Cast of Bread

Pompeii

Bread of Picenum

Picenum was a town in Italy which was well known 2000 years ago for its speciality bread.

This bread requires a yeast starter or “mother dough”. Mix flour and warm water to form a loose batter and add chopped currants. Leave for a few days until the mixture is fermenting.

Pane Picenum

500g Wholewheat Emmer flour 2 tablespoons of Mother Dough200ml warm whole milk2 teaspoons of Honey50g Currants25ml Olive Oil

Add the honey and currants to warm milk and leave to infuse for an hour.Mix in the flour, currant mix and the mother dough and kneed into a stiff dough. Leave to rise for an hour.Knock back and kneed a second time, form into a round loaf shape and leave to rise and double in size.Bake at 190°C for 23 minutes.Glaze with olive oil whilst still hot.Cool before eating.

Tudor Baking

During Tudor times, baking bread was very much in the medieval tradition, using brick or stone ovens which had to be fired up before each bake.

Mixed grain bread was used for workers and artisans. Refined white bread was eaten by the aristocracy. Society at this time was very class orientated.

At the end of the bakers day, clapbread would be made up from bran, left over flour and probably floor sweepings. The oven would not be fired up and this bread would cook in the residual heat from the last bake. It was a very cheep bread for the poor.

Peasebread was made when all of the grain had been used up. Peas, beans and vetch would be milled to make an inferior loaf.

Clapbread or Peasebread

Ingredients A Ingredients B300g pea flour 400g bran300g wheat flour 200g bean flourYeast Yeast500ml warm water 500ml warm water

Ingredients C 400g Bran200g wheat flourYeast500ml warm water

During the 19th Century there were many types of bread made regionally. Many homes and businesses baked their own bread in their own ovens.

19th Century Bread

This bread was made as pub grub, to go with cheese and pickles and a pint of ale.

Lancashire Riddle Bread

Riddle Bread

300g Oatmeal flour50g Sourdough yeast starterWarm Water

Make like a pizza base and use a skewer or a ruler to mark the rolled out dough very deeply.Bake at 200°C for 15 minutes.

This is a quick to make bread which can be easily split into pieces.

Traditionally it was spread thickly with butter which sat in the riddle like grooves.

Fin

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